


The Handling and Care of Mick Rory

by nirejseki



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, M/M, Multi, mostly comfort, unmitigated fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-24
Updated: 2016-04-24
Packaged: 2018-06-04 02:43:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6638161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nirejseki/pseuds/nirejseki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tumblr prompt: "Cold/Flash/Wave, Barry and Len trying to fuss over Mick? (Take him out to dinner, get him nice things which are on fire, sex, not sex, basically something that's taking care of him emotionally but isn't so saccharine that it's OOC)."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Handling and Care of Mick Rory

“Hey, Barry!” Cisco called. “We have a hit – looks like a Cold Gun activation. It’s in a warehouse down by Stevenson and Madison.”

“On it!” Barry sped out the door. The cold gun signature hadn’t gone off in a while, even though Barry knew for a (personal) fact that Len was in town. That meant that Len had figured out a way to avoid Cisco’s detection system and was deliberately not using it now. Or maybe he hadn’t had a chance to use the gun? (Like that was likely – Len was the sort of person to use the gun to make his trips to the kitchen in the morning more interesting, and Barry could state this for a definitive fact.) So maybe –

Barry skidded into the warehouse in question, questions unresolved. Len was perched on a barrel, contemplating…okay, Barry had no idea what that used to be, but it was currently a giant icicle. 

Barry blinked. “Uh. Captain Cold?” he tried.

Len turned and arched an eyebrow at him. 

Oh. So it was _that_ sort of meeting. Barry reached up to his comm, saying “Hey, looks like a false alarm. There’s a giant icicle, but no one else. I’m going to head home; talk tomorrow?”

“Sounds good.” Cisco’s voice buzzed through the comm. “Later, man!”

Barry clicked it off and pushed off his cowl, turning to smile back at his boyfriend. “Hey, Len.”

Len didn’t smile back. 

“Len? What’s up?” Barry sped over, careful not to go into Len’s blind spot or to touch him. Len had gotten much better about Barry’s tendency to want to touch all the time, but that was when he was in a good mood. “Tell me.”

“Mick’s having a bad day,” Len finally said. “Everything’s bothering him, and he’s just itching to get into it with one of us.”

Barry nodded. They’d warned him, when he’d started out with them, that they both had bad days occasionally. Just bad moods that wouldn’t end, where Len retreated further and further into himself until he couldn’t be reached by anyone yet hated to be alone, or where Mick alternated between lashing out at everyone and everything without cause and a dull listlessness that couldn’t be roused. Barry got it, had told them about the days where he wanted to run and run and run until his legs burned and everything hurt just to make everything stop and how they could help him deal with those days. Len had had a few instances so far and it had been tough, but they’d gotten through it.

Mick, though, this was the first one that he wasn’t able to handle on his own using his usual fire- and violence-related stress outlets. Barry had no doubt they’d get through this one, too. (Seriously, even with the criminal antics, this was easily the best relationship he’d been in yet. Actually, the cops and robbers thing was kind of fun, not that he would admit that.)

“What do we do?”

Len shrugged. “Try to cheer him up, mostly, and don’t take anything he says personally. I had a couple of ideas, but I’ll take anything you’ve got.”

“Well, it’s Thursday; I’ve got work tomorrow, but after that I can free up my weekend,” Barry offered. 

Len nodded and started to lay out his plans. 

They started out small, still pretending that they hadn’t noticed that Mick’s in an incredibly grumpy mood. Len coaxes him out to one of their favorite bars on Friday on the basis that Barry’s already there and waiting, but when the inevitable bar fight breaks out (Barry has an underrated talent for starting shit, he discovers, which may explain more of his career as the Flash than he’d like), Mick doesn’t jump into it with his usual gusto. Sure, he knocks one or two heads together, but only when they wander into his path.

Barry digs around in STAR Labs’ storeroom – the one he private nicknamed “Cisco’s Secret Room of Fail” because seriously, does Cisco honestly expect them to believe everything he tries to invent works on the first try? Barry is so onto him – and manages to dig up something appropriately mechanical and scary-looking. He has no idea what it does, but he’s pretty sure Mick will be able to waste hours trying to figure it out. Mick does get interested, which raises Barry’s hopes, but ends up putting it to the side. (Len takes one look at it and swears it’s a toaster. Barry points out that that conclusion makes no logical sense whatsoever based on its appearance. Len points out that this is Cisco they’re talking about. Mick spends the rest of the evening smirking at them as they bicker over it, which Barry counts as a, like, half-point of success.)

They team up on the next one. Barry zips a nice barbeque unit over to their roof (it’s not stealing, _he’s going to return it_ , Len needs to stop making comments about corrupting him because it’s not like he’s some sweet innocent puppy dog unicorn, okay? Stop it!) and Len manages to acquire a startlingly large amount of meat. Mick spends the next few hours blissfully making enough delicious, delicious BBQ that even Barry feels like he can’t move for the next few hours. Barry isn’t sure if Mick felt better for it, but they are _definitely_ doing that again. _So. Good._ Mick even manages to serve out a perfect collection of well-done (Mick), medium (Barry), and “I think that’s still mooing” (Len). Barry is totally going to make Mick do the food for the inevitable “hey, guess who I’ve been dating!” intro to Joe and Iris – the Wests have always been very, very forgiving when faced with a set of ribs so tender and juicy that the meat drips off the bone if you so much as wave a fork near it. 

Of course, there’s always fire, Mick’s favorite pastime. But Barry can’t think of a way to let Mick use his gun (love of his life, with Len and Barry making up a tolerable second place) without him also having to, you know, stop him. He _is_ the Flash, after all. Barry is starting to worry that he’ll have to dig up some metahuman threat that requires Len and Mick to come in, guns _literally_ blazing, to help as allies when Len asks him if he could use his access to City Hall to put some paperwork through. When Barry sees what type of paperwork, he nearly dies laughing, and agrees.

Mick is dragged, very reluctantly, to the oldest, crappiest-looking warehouse on the far side of the harbor. “I know what you two are trying to do,” he informs them. “It ain’t gonna work. I’m not a six year old you can distract with shiny objects.”

“Who are you trying to kid, Mick?” Len drawled. “You’re exactly that. Your shiny object is just a little more flammable than the next six year old.”

Mick looks intrigued. “I thought our little spark of lightning here said lighting fires in city limits was a no-go.”

“Len found a go-around,” Barry volunteered. “And this,” he gestured to the warehouse. “Is it.”

Mick looked at the warehouse interestedly. It was full of old furniture – very flammable – and some metal crates – less flammable initially, but if he turned his gun onto them they’d make a real pretty light – plus a number of other knick-knacks. “What’s the catch?” he asked. “You going to put it out the minute I start it?”

“No catch,” Barry assured him. “The Flash is only required to stop criminal acts.”

Mick turned and stared at his two grinning boyfriends. “And this isn’t criminal?” he asked doubtfully.

Barry pulled out the piece of paper he’d gotten officially stamped. “Nope. Len here submitted the lowest bid for the demolition of a long-lasting eyesore cluttering up Central’s dockside district. So it’s totally 100% legal for you to do anything you want with the place, as long as it’s totally destroyed by the end of it.”

“Best of all,” Len added. “The city’s paying us for the privilege. By the hour, so, you know, take your time.”

They both watched as Mick fought with himself, the sheer glee at the idea winning out over the lingering sulk he’d been stuck in until he was grinning like a maniac. 

“Okay, fine,” he conceded, wrapping an arm around each of them. “I admit it. I’m six. Now tell me you guys remembered to bring accelerant.” 

“I couldn’t figure out which type you’d like,” Barry confessed. “So I got, like, six different varieties. I figured we could try a different one on each side of the building?”

Mick laughed.


End file.
